Arm Pain

Related Symptoms:

Definition

Pain in the arm (shoulder to fingers)

Includes shoulder, elbow, wrist and finger joints

Includes minor muscle strains from hard work or sports (overuse)

Pain is not caused by an injury

Causes of Arm Pain

Muscle Overuse (Strained Muscles). Arm pains are often from hard muscle work or sports. Examples are too much throwing or swimming. They are most common in the shoulder. This type of pain can last from hours up to 7 days.

Muscle Cramps. Brief pains that last 1 to 15 minutes are often due to muscle cramps. These occur in the hand after too much writing or typing.

Viral Illness. Mild muscle aches in both arms also occur with many viral illnesses.

Septic Arthritis (Serious). This is a bacterial infection of a joint space. Main symptoms are fever and severe pain with movement of the joint. Range of motion is limited or absent (a "frozen joint").

Pain Scale

Mild: your child feels pain and tells you about it. But, the pain does not keep your child from any normal activities. School, play and sleep are not changed.

Moderate: the pain keeps your child from doing some normal activities. It may wake him or her up from sleep.

Severe: the pain is very bad. It keeps your child from doing all normal activities.